May 15, 2005 - Groundbreaking!

With shovels in hand, dignitaries and members of the Michigan Iron Industry Museum's Future Historians group smile despite the day's gray skies and snow flurries.


Left to right: Friends of Michigan History board member Geneva Wiskemann and Friends president Francis R. "Bus" Spaniola present a $1,000 check to U.P. museum regional manager Tom Friggens and Michigan Historical Museum System director Phil Kwiatkowski for the Michigan Iron Industry Museum's "Forging Our Future" capital campaign.

Week of May 23, 2005

Workers begin pouring the footings for the Michigan Iron Industry Museum expansion project.

Week of June 6, 2005

The outline of the building addition takes shape as several workers lay the first course of blocks for the foundation.

Week of June 13, 2005

Masons complete the south wall of the MIIM expansion project.


The south and east walls of the Michigan Iron Industry Museum expansion start to provide a glimpse of how the finished addition will look.

Week of June 20, 2005

The Michigan Iron Industry Museum expansion project continues with workers topping the exterior walls of the new addition.

Week of July 4, 2005

Steel beams begin to present the roofline of the Michigan Iron Industry Museum as it will look when the expansion project is completed later this year.

Week of July 25, 2005

The steel roof trusses offer a bright contrast against the green trees surrounding the Michigan Iron Industry Museum.

Week of August 15, 2005

Upper roof truss work nears completion as the addition to the Michigan Iron Industry Museum takes on its final shape.

Week of August 22, 2005

Inside the new building addition, workers smooth the freshly poured concrete floor as another worker brings more mix in a wheelbarrow.

Week of September 12, 2005

Construction continued indoors as workers framed in office space and the atrium partitions below clerestory windows, and installed pink batts of insulation.

Week of September 26, 2005

A worker watches as his colleague on a stepladder installs a cedar panel in the ceiling of the Michigan Iron Industry Museum's new office area.

Week of October 10, 2005

The Michigan Iron Industry Museum's addition is visible in the bacground as workers smooth out a new sidewalk.

Week of October 17, 2005

Continued good weather allows workers to beautify the reconfigured museum entrance with new sod.

Week of October 24, 2005

Workers make an asphalt road that will wrap around from the front of the Michigan Iron Industry Museum to the garage doors in back of the new building addition.

Week of October 31, 2005

Two workers assemble and install furniture and cabinets in the Michigan Iron Industry Museum's new office area.

Week of November 14, 2005

A blanket of snow covers the ground around the new building addition of the Michigan Iron Industry Museum in Negaunee. The addition will bring new exhibits to the museum and provide indoor exhibit space for the 1860s locomotive Yankee.